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Ljink96 on 19 December 2016
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spemanig said:
Ljink96 said:

Going by rumors it's going to be $250, which is what the Vita and 3DS retailed at. I didn't bring up the other consoles because it was their respective competiton or not, I brought it up because Switch will be more powerful than all the devices listed, which is very appealing for the rumored price.

My entire point about the switch is, it's not a deathmatch with PS4 or Xbox One or Scorpio or Pro. Nintendo's simply trying to bridge the gap between their handheld and console markets. Which means, there won't be a stand alone handheld or a standalone console, so naturally when 3DS is discontinued, and Pokemon Stars or Pokemon Red Blue 2, Fire Emblem Switch, etc. come out, they won't be on the 3DS. They'll only be available on the Switch and that's where the power of the switch and its shared library come into play. People don't realize that Nintendo's handheld market, although slowly declining, is nothing to sneeze at. 61 million units is huge for a "Dying" breed. 

But not only will Switch inherit the handheld lineup, it'll have the console specific games as well. So I don't think it's so black and white as you portray it as. There are users who didn't buy a PS4 or Xbox One and don't care frankly, who own a 3DS. Once the 3DS no longer recieves support, if the customer was satisfied with the last 6-7 years of 3DS, they'll most likely buy the Switch because again, the software has moved. So you have that market that Switch is competing for. Then you have the market who does see Switch as a competitor to PS4 and Xbox One because they are aware or are interested in PS and XB and want to see what Nintendo has to offer. That's the market you're referring to and it's much smaller than the first one I've mentioned. 

Switch's success will bank mostly on the portable franchises that will jump ship from 3DS onto Switch. And those consumers who enjoyed 3DS will follow the software that you can't get on PS4, Xbox One, or 3DS. If Switch doesn't get support from games like Red Dead 2, Call of Duty, etc. (which have always sold poorly on Nintendo consoles), it isn't the end of the world. 

3DS and Vita aren't relevant to Switch buyers. PS4 and XBO are. It doesn't matter if Switch is 100x more powerful than a 3DS. It may as well not exist to them.

They are not trying to bridge anything. They are trying to unify their software platforms. That's different. Of course they are going to inherit some of their handheld audience because of games like Pokemon, but that's not enough. 3DS was only competing with Vita. Switch will be competing against PS4 and XBO. It's a completely different battle field, even with Pokemon. 61m people bought 3DS because the alternative was Vita. The alternative to Switch is PS4 and XBO. I can not be anymore clear. Nothing is black and white, but there are not many shades to this.

The Switch will absolutely die in the West if it banks mostly on handheld-exclusice franchises. The west doesn't care about handheld franchises. They care about home console franchises. No one in the mass market is hoping to buy the Switch for Persona Q or Zero Escape. They want it to but big budget, AAA, console quality games like Skyrim and NBA 2K. If that's not what's coming to the Switch, it will crash hard. That's how it was marketed, and that's why that video got 22m views on Youtube. Because it's being marketed at people who want a home console software experience.

No, no, no, Switch is highly relevant to Switch buyers because it will replace the 3DS. People who own PS4 and Xbox One aren't going to buy something that doesn't do what their console does, if not more. And with your statements, they really elope and attack one another. You say western gamers don't care about handheld franchises, but the 3DS is one of the greatest success stories of this generation. It certainly wasn't Wii U or Vita or Xbone, PS4 and 3DS are the only huge success stories of this generation. Yes, they've slipped compared to last gen but it's something. If the west doesn't care about handheld franchises, 3DS wouldn't be selling like it is and 3DS software wouldn't be selling like it has. I used to think the same thing, only AAA home console games really "matter" but that couldn't be any more far from the truth. 

Tons of money goes into developing a game like Call of Duty. For example Infinite Warfare. You know hundreds of millions went into developing that game. Or at least in the 50's of millions. And then you take a game like Pokemon Sun and Moon which couldn't have taken more than 10 million to develop, as it runs off a modified XY engine, with models from X and Y. As of now, Pokemon has outsold CoD on one platform vs. COD IW which was available on numerous platforms. Nintendo in return already has recouped any development costs on Pokemon Sun and Moon by the sales figures alone which is about 8 million right now. What am I getting at? With Switch, it's possible to make games with minimum input (development costs) but with a high yeild and that's always been Nintendo's strategy, which is why I'm not necessarily worried about them. If Nintendo succeds on Switch, the rest will follow. 

And bro, it's not just Pokemon that's been selling on 3DS. It's been Mario, Zelda, Smash, Animal Crossing, Yokai Watch, Dragon Quest, Persona, Kirby, Donkey Kong, etc. That's the software that will power Switch and its sales. Not 3rd party games that will be mediocre on switch anyways. Switch isn't meant to compete with PS4 and Xbox One's software. The hardware is proof of this. A AAA western console style game not only would not sell and hasn't sold on Nintendo consoles since the SNES, it wouldn't be ideal to do so. Handheld games will benefit most from Switch in return. Taking Mario Kart 8 on the go, that's something 3DS could never accomplish. So now you have people who have only played Mario Kart 7 that want the new Mario Kart and it's on the Switch. That's a score for the handheld portion of Switch. 

And come on, bridging, unifying, they're mostly the same thing and we know what I meant. Unifying the software library while bridging the gap of what it means to be handheld and home console, the same way they operated on Mario's new 3D series. 

You also said 3DS was only competing with Vita and it was a handheld, yet you also say Switch is only competing with PS4 and Xbox One and it's neither a handheld or a console...that really doesn't make much sense. You're trying to pin what Switch is going to go up against to one or the other and the issue is, it's both. The "west" that you refer to is also broken down into 2 groups. The "West" that cares about Nintendo software and hardware, and the "West" that couldn't give 2 shits about NIntendo. Nintend obviously wants to cater to the first group that cares about their software and hardware because the other side isn't going to care anyways. There is a market over here that cares about Nintendo's handheld software and hardware. By your same logic, the west doesn't care about Xbox either and that simply isn't true. 

Anybody who expects switch to compete with PS4 and Xbox on any level is quite insane. Nintendo will set their own rules and boundaries with Switch. Is that a good thing or a bad thing? Only time will tell. Gamecube had 3rd party support, it failed hard. Wii didn't have the same games PS3 or 360 had and it outsold both. Wii U didn't have any PS4 or One software and it bombed. It's not about what western support comes to Nintendo consoles. It hasn't been about western support since the Gamecube days. It's been about Nintendo creating unheard of experiences and banking on the media to catch on to their "great idea". They're like the apple of the gaming industry. It's also highly important that Nintendo makes sure to not neglect their homeland and Switch really caters to that audience's lifestyle. Always mobile, but if you can get amazing graphics like that on the go, from a company as reputable as Nintendo, it's going to sell over there. There's a reason why 3DS is the best selling console in Japan. Not because it has western support, not because it's more powerful than the Vita, but because it is cheap, has great accessible games and its so Nintendo. It's also why Nintendo can continue to rise in value and post profit as handheld development is far less costly than console development. If Nintendo can equate what it means to be a handheld/console game they can only win.